Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

DH and Dinner - AIBU

682 replies

Redlioness123 · 23/10/2019 19:15

I'm just really interested to know whether I am BU or not, as my husband thinks I'm being controlling

I have made a lasagne today. It's not something we have often so I spent a bit of time on it making it from scratch etc. I also cut a nice salad to go along with it and I was planning to make some seasoned wedges before serving around 7.15pm (the time we eat most days).

DH arrived home from work around 6.30. Claimed he was starving, I told him what was for dinner and to have a banana or something (Lasagne is already made and is staying warm at the bottom of the oven)

I went out the kitchen to do something and returned after 5 mins to see that he has helped himself to a ginormous serving of the lasagne and begins complimenting me about delicious it is. I got visibly annoyed and asked why he couldn't have something else or at the very least, a tiny portion rather than a dinner-sized portion. His response was that he is only going to have a small spoon of it when we sit down for dinner and have a plate made up mainly of salad and wedges instead Hmm

I've left him to it but it's pissed me off so much - he does this all the time and I think it's so disrespectful to someone who's been slaving away in a kitchen to just dip into a hot dinner they've made like it's a snack. Is it weird that I would want to eat it and enjoy it together?? Maybe I'm just being silly - it would be great to get opinions!

Also I'm not sure if it's relevant but I work full time too and usually try to get home much earlier than DH to make a start on his snack dinner

OP posts:
ChazsBrilliantAttitude · 24/10/2019 11:52

He is 20 stone. How tall is he?

To put it in perspective in the NHS BMI calculator a 6’4” is obese at 20 stone. So unless he is an sportsman or bodybuilder he has a weight problem.

DoctorAllcome · 24/10/2019 11:52

Also DoctorAllcome if your children always eat with adults, someone has to wait for their dinner until everyone is home to eat it, and no-one would eat a portion first, before everyone else was ready

No. That’s not the case at all. Someone is always home with the kids in the evening. So what we do is we check in with each other and say when do we want dinner? If kid A says, soon as you can cook it cause I hungry then those of us only peckish just eat dinner a bit early so as to keep each other company.
If one of us isn’t home by then, they’ll eat when they get home and one or more of us will sit with them to keep them company. No one has to wait to eat dinner when hungry.
We are just super flexible on weeknights.

Span1elsRock · 24/10/2019 12:08

He's an adult and you're not responsible for his diet or lifestyle.

It must be really awful to have to stand back and watch someone doing this to themselves but it took me reaching 19 stone and going onto medication for my diabetes for me to see the light. I'm now 4 stone lighter and have made a complete lifestyle change but it took hitting the bottom for that to happen......

ineedaholidaynow · 24/10/2019 12:24

DoctorAllcome we are pretty flexible on weeknights too as we have quite a few things on, but the cry of "I'm hungry' and then eating part of the dinner before the rest is ready, especially when someone else is still busily preparing the rest of it, wouldn't cut the mustard in our house.

If they needed to be somewhere urgently but dinner had taken slightly longer to cook than initially thought, that would be different, and something would be thrown together to ensure they had enough to eat, but if it was just because they were hungry (and had eaten 2 meals and had snacks already during the day) they would have to wait, especially if it wasn't going to be that long before it was going to be ready. If the DH had helped either with preparing the rest of dinner or bedtime, he probably wouldn't have noticed the time he had to wait for dinner and it might have been ready sooner.

If my DH comes in from work and he sees that I am trying to multi task by cooking dinner, sorting out stuff for a meeting, helping DS with homework etc, then he would ask what he could do to help, and if he was especially hungry he would probably help with sorting out dinner to speed up preparation time.

userxx · 24/10/2019 12:44

seaweedandmarchingbands Its not about control, its about not wanting someone you love to end up poorly or dead. If my OH had reached 20 stone and was eating himself into an early grave too bloody right i would be stepping in.

DoctorAllcome · 24/10/2019 12:53

@ineedaholidaynow
Too many rules is all I have to say. Rules=control.
Especially if a supposedly equal partner cannot make an exception without the other partners permission.

FizzyGreenWater · 24/10/2019 12:57

Could be or could be not. OP said he plays rugby. The heaviest professional rugby player Uini Antonio is 23 stone 12. But go ahead and jump to conclusions.

Err, think you're the one doing the jumping. OP said he plays football - once a week. I think we can safely say he's unlikely to have the excuse that he's a mighty prop forward wall of sheer muscle.

BMI may be a coarse tool but for 20 stone, he would have to be six foot NINE before he even made it out of the obese category and into seriously overweight Heart attack material? Ooof now, let's not jump to conclusions!!!

OP has said he describes himself as a food addict and knows he has an issue, suggesting things like later eating himself to stop him snacking.

Hopefully last night will trigger more conversation on this topic. Because call me an ole' conclusion jumper but he's clearly pretty unhealthy and not happy with it.

ineedaholidaynow · 24/10/2019 13:01

Maybe in some homes rules = manners.

Would you think it is ok whilst one partner is rushing around trying to get everything done whilst the other partner eats their half prepared dinner because they are ‘starving’?

The OP’s DH has in fact acknowledged this was rude (although I am assuming some of you think he is only saying this because he is scared of his controlling wife)

DappledThings · 24/10/2019 13:02

Too many rules is all I have to say. Rules=control. Especially if a supposedly equal partner cannot make an exception without the other partners permission.

Nothing in ineedaholidaynow's post says rules to me. Just normal cooperation and working together as a family should.

madcatladyforever · 24/10/2019 13:05

Hangry?

HungryForApples · 24/10/2019 13:06

I'd have been a bit annoyed, but I'd decide that it's not that big of a deal - you still ate together in the end.

But since it did piss you off so much, did you explain to him how your felt and ask him not to do it again? He shouldn't be intentionally doing things that upset you

HungryForApples · 24/10/2019 13:11

Oh nevermind, I hadn't RTFT. Glad that it sounds like he's learned his lesson

seaweedandmarchingbands · 24/10/2019 13:40

too bloody right i would be stepping in.

“Stepping in” IS about control. It’s not your right to manage the diet of another adult, whether you are married to them or not.

Wizzbangpop · 24/10/2019 14:05

I lived in i thy someone like this as a student. Would sometimes do meals for the whole flat. Drive me potty when they did it

userxx · 24/10/2019 14:15

seaweedandmarchingbands - so you would happily sit back and let someone get in such a bad way they could possibly die? Its got nothing whatsoever do with control.

seaweedandmarchingbands · 24/10/2019 14:16

userxx

That is a non-sequitur. I didn’t say I wouldn’t try to help them. I said it isn’t my right to control them.

MoonGeek · 24/10/2019 14:17

This from hullygully

*It's not really about the food is it?

You are trying to create a nice evening for the two of you after the baby has gone to bed and sharing a meal is a key part of that. That is a nice caring thing to want to do and he is an arse.*

Also it's just good manners. I can't believe there are so many YABUs.

Butterymuffin · 24/10/2019 14:40

It’s not your right to manage the diet of another adult

Including making the whole meal for him? Or is that kind of management of someone's diet acceptable?
Plus the husband has asked in various ways for OP to 'manage' his diet by stopping him eating again late in the evening and so on.

NoCauseRebel · 24/10/2019 14:45

Great, now we’re fat shaming and saying a fat person deserves to have their food controlled and treated with contempt for their own good. hardly fat shaming to point out that someone weighing twenty stone is at risk of serious health conditions. It’s not fat shaming, it’s the truth.

Yes it may be his choice to decide to lose weight but it’s the OP’s choice whether she accepts that his being severely overweight to the point of obesity or whether she in fact puts steps in place in their home to try to mitigate that serious illness happening on her watch.

If someone posted here that their partner came home and drank three bottles of wine of a night people would tell her not to buy in any alcohol, and that while he has to be the one to choose to give up drinking, he should buy his own alcohol and for the OP not to buy it. Food is no different. But we’ve become too apologetic about the fact that people are obese because to want them not to be is fat shaming apparently.

Yes of course there are often valid reasons why people are overweight, but the fact that the amount of obesity is increasing is not all down to psychological issues. And even when it is, people do still need to take account of the consequences when not doing so could lead them to become seriously ill or worse and leaving their partners and children without a parent.

FWIW if people came home hungry and dinner was ready then I’d suggest that we eat sooner rather than later.

It would piss me off more if someone started snacking on the crisps etc while I was literally still preparing dinner. My DP does this and it drives me round the bend.

He also starts his dinner before anyone else has sat down and that even drives DS up the wall and I have got to the point where I don’t put the cutlery on the table until everything has been served. Because that 30 seconds isn’t going to kill him, and it’s basic manners to wait for everyone to be at the table before starting. ESP given we actually all sit down at the table to eat. Eating in front of the TV etc is different but not the table.

seaweedandmarchingbands · 24/10/2019 14:57

Including making the whole meal for him? Or is that kind of management of someone's diet acceptable?

Even when you are the cook. You still don’t get to tell other adults in their own home what and when they are allowed to eat. He has asked for support, not to be ordered like a child. And more to the point, it will not help. He has to do it himself.

ineedaholidaynow · 24/10/2019 15:11

So does that happen when they are 18 seaweed? Does it just apply to partners or adult children as well?

If you had bought some food for a special meal, are you not allowed to tell anyone not to eat it as it will be needed for that particular meal.

I can see it being a control thing if you had cooked a meal and everything was ready and everyone was ready to eat and nobody had anything else to do, and you made everyone wait 2 hours until 9pm to eat, and you only cooked what you thought everyone should eat. But in normal circumstances when you are meant to be having a family meal at a normal time, I can't see why you can't ask someone to wait until the actual meal is ready and all the necessary tasks ie putting baby to bed, are done.

seaweedandmarchingbands · 24/10/2019 15:13

You can ask. And if it is an adult child who doesn’t pay bills, you can tell. But I respect my DH as an adult. I don’t tell him what to do. If he keeps doing something that obviously frustrates me, I will tell him, and we will have a conversation. My recourse in the event that we can’t agree a compromise or if he will not do as I ask is to leave, or put up with it. He’s not under management.

DappledThings · 24/10/2019 15:17

I don’t tell him what to do

I don't tell my DH what to do either. In this circumstance the issue would never have arisen because neither of us would dream of grabbing our own dinner while the other person isnt ready to eat because they are busy doing other jobs.

seaweedandmarchingbands · 24/10/2019 15:18

I don't tell my DH what to do either. In this circumstance the issue would never have arisen because neither of us would dream of grabbing our own dinner while the other person isnt ready to eat because they are busy doing other jobs.

Great.

DappledThings · 24/10/2019 15:19

It is great being considerate and pleasant yes.